


Captain's Honour

by Sparrowhawkshadow



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Abominations (Dragon Age), Abuse, Aftermath of Torture, Blood Mages, Blood Magic, Blood Magic (Dragon Age), Blood and Gore, Blood and Torture, Brutal Murder, Corruption, Dark, Deal with a Devil, Demonic Possession, Demons, Devil's Advocate, Dragon Age Headcanons, Dragon Age II Quest - Raiders on the Cliffs, Dragon Age II Spoilers, Evil, Evil Plans, Evil With Actual Reasons, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, M/M, Minor Character(s), Morally Ambiguous Character, Morally Evil Character, Morals Have Left This Ship, Non-Romantic Piracy, POV Minor Character, POV Third Person, Period-Typical Racism, Piracy, Pirates, Police Brutality, Pre-Quest, Prequel, Racism, Raiders On The Cliffs, Rare Pairings, Revenge, Sexual Abuse, Sympathy for the Devil, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-16 22:54:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28714599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sparrowhawkshadow/pseuds/Sparrowhawkshadow
Summary: ~ Two pirates find each other again after being captured by the guards, and make plans. Wicked plans. ~
Relationships: Fell Orden/Victor Longtouch
Comments: 2
Kudos: 1





	Captain's Honour

**Author's Note:**

> There is an actual pirate novel titled "Captain Blood". The table appears courtesy of Christopher Marlowe. This story references the novel and the play as well as the Dragon Age II mission with Fell Orden and Victor Longtouch.
> 
> They are actually canon characters though I took some creative liberties. The names are mentioned by Captain Harley during Raiders on the Cliffs, as well as Isabela, whose first comment on Orden is "Shit!". And then there are the two elves whose case sparks the Qunari raid, the one Aveline says was being "investigated".  
> I have headcanons.
> 
> Note:  
> As an aside, a spinning maid is a small device used for hand-twining yarn on a spinning wheel. Colloquially, it used to be the idea of 'a busy little thing sitting there at the bottom turning about in place, to be of service.'  
> I tried to hit pirate's slang with this, plundered several sailor's novels worth (Melville: Moby Dick, Melville, Billy Budd, Stevenson: Treasure Island)  
> \- and I likely still failed. Sorry.
> 
> I've no idea whether this is any good, or just a big mess. It was originally a brainstorm for said headcanon. Oh well.

~~~

"... - and then I told him, Johnny me lad – he protested said his name was Willum or sum‘thin‘, - but -", a loud roar of protests went up around the greasy old oaken table at the top of Elmo‘s Fire. The tavern was at the top of an old broken down Tevinter watchtower in the seedier parts of the harbour, and also a favourite haunt of scoundrels, ne-er do wells, and – pirates.

"Ye ain‘t go‘ no feelin‘ for spinnin‘ a yarn, Cap‘tain!" the loudest of them protested, in a cheerful voice, his speech carrying a breeze with the tale of many docks and ports and little of his first origin.

He was a tall man with a swarty complexion like Rivaini tea, muscles like chewed sinew in his hands and arms bare of his dirty blue tunic. The tunic's sleeves were rolled to heavy-jointed elbows, and his shoulders were as wide as a gallon‘s mainsail. A heavy composite bow leaned against the table‘s edge, immaculate in a shiny leather-and-wax covering next to the tip of his dirty boot. The other boot he had hooked against toppling over under the table‘s edge, and from where he was currently swaying dangerously on the back of his chair. His eyes were as blue as his curly hair was dark, slipping out of a sloppy braid, and his formerly sharp aquiline nose had clearly been broken more than once. As had his crooked front teeth, of which one was missing even as the rest were remarkably white, a shark‘s grin in the murky darkness.

"Ain‘t ever be a spinnin‘ maid now, Victor, I‘s a tragedy I knows", the narrator countered good-naturedly, and the dinn quieted for the few moments he spoke, as if even these rough-cuts had some respect for the fellow. His clothes were just as tattered as their own, if not more, and covered in old bloodstains – they fit him ill, but the heavy sword at his hip fit him much better. Even in his rags, he seemed to command the room easily.

"Jus‘ go on, go on!" One of the sailors cried. "You gutted him o‘ wha‘?!"

"But of course not", the man in the chair said pleasantly, his accent slipping through for once. The archer swinging in the chair shot him a sharp look, but everyone else was too drunk and merry to care. "There‘s way slo‘wr ways to get dead, friends." The narrator had caught his stride again. He threw a wink, and drained his glass, and the table laughed uproarously, cheering for him as he spun the tale onward.

~

"What happened really?" Victor said, as they were meandering towards the brothel on the docks that doubled as board for the less reputable sailors in the back, the ones that didn‘t want to be asked too many questions and didn‘t want the harbourmaster‘s stamp on their passes – or didn‘t have any.

The Captain stopped in the narrow alleyway, and Victor reflexively turned to look. Two rats fighting at the corner over a piece of foul fish innards, a mangy dog curled into a fetal round behind a bulk of discarded tarp, but no people. Even the harlots had gone home. It was quite late, even for the Docks – it was almost ready for the fishermen to set out with high tide in early morning.

Finding themselves alone, Orden turned to him, the murky lights erasing his dark face in the shadows but glancing off his crockedly shaven head, stark like the shape of a bloodied skull, the raw patches from a cruel knife dark where his hair had earlier shielded him from the sun, high cheekbones and heavy jaws even more pronounced as the bleached lighting drew the life from him and painted him in sharp relief – his body might be in tatters as much as his stolen clothes, but the line of his neck and back was a proud as ever, maybe more. His eyes gleamed like burnished copper.

He must be holding up his posture with will alone, Victor thought.

"Do you want to know?" the Captain said, and anyone else, anyone, Victor would have knifed for daring to call him a liar, but he knew it was a warning, that Orden never doubted his courage, or what he was willing to stomach – never had.

Victor did the same as the captain, was the rule. What Orden saw, he also saw, and what Orden did, he did too. If his captain had asked him to slice his own guts he‘d have done it, without question, because he knew Orden would too – had seen him do it, as it was.

Victor shuddered.

He‘d seen that man almost faint in his arms only hours earlier, and only the presence of that elf girl watching judgingly had kept the Captain‘s stubborn pride and his feet from giving out under him. He had to be thankful to his stubbornness and his pride, because he suspected – knew it with the clenching of his gut – that pride and rage was the only thing that had kept his captain alive long enough to not surrender to the pain, to come back.

"Yes", Victor said.

The Captain threw him another long look – one that Victor waited out patiently now. He was a sharpshooter. He knew how to wait, and he knew that now, decision made, Orden wasn‘t questioning him – just thinking of how to go about it. That he was even thinking about it was warning on its own. They didn‘t mince words between them. His own hands were trembling. Victor‘s hands never did when he went to line up a shot, no matter how tricky, but now they were.

Victor carefully kept his mind blank like Orden had taught him, the way you did against an invading demon, or an invading enemy crew. No retreat, and no quarter.

He suspected Orden was using the same trick, as his fingers – how were they steady? - but he knew how, Orden‘s will was beyond anything human – slow fingers started down the line of his chest, stiff with dried patches of brown flaking blood. So much blood.

Victor hissed as the stolen shirt fell away to reveal the black bruises on his ribs and hips, and the silvery too-smooth skin of the magically healed cut, across his abdomen and up. It should have eviscerated a man.

It would have eviscerated a man.

"Is that from yourself or - "

"No, that‘s a broken bottle when they thought I was about done", Orden said, in a clipped voice too crips for his level of drink. He looked out over where the moon gleamed over the Gallows, fell and sickly, his eyes blank silver disks just the same, his face as cold as his voice. "Fools. Thought they‘d watch Captain Blood bleed out, how hilarious. Should have just killed me. Or gotten the Templars straight away. Not even Magebane and Lyrium shackles stops a demon at death."

Victor paused, his hand carefully brushing up the man‘s side. Orden didn‘t flinch– but he never did.

"And the bruises." Victor whispered, poison creeping into his voice. It promised a slow death. "Those bruises, that‘s odd."

"Old now, my friend", Orden said, turning to him, and placed a hand over the archer‘s. It was warm from drink now, but Victor couldn‘t forget how cold he‘d been when he‘d found him in the Markets, as cold as death, and barely standing. "They paid in blood." Orden‘s red eyes were almost – kind, and it drove a spike of ice in his gut.

"What did they do to you!" he repeated again, harsher now, his whisper even more quiet, a hiss.

"They tied me to an upturned table and stripped me", the Captain said, and Victor did flinch now, but Orden held his hand in a vice, refusing to let him pull away. His captain‘s voice was deadly calm. "Do I need to say the rest? They‘re dead now."

"Not dead enough." Victor said in a choked voice. "I – I‘ll kill them all – their wives, their children, their doddering little granddads, their fucking _dogs_ \- "

"And we will", Orden said, and when Victor finally managed to tear his gaze up, he was looking straight at him, red eyes calm like icy sea – but a fire burning underneath, a demon waiting just behind. A demon of blood, and righteousness, and a promise. "We will. Be patient. Revenge - "

" - is best served cold." Victor finished, and breathed out, closing his eyes. His weight was heavy against Orden‘s side.

"Why am I the one who‘s failing now, hmm?"

"Because now is not then", Orden said firmly, closing harsh fingers around the back of a sun-browned neck and pushing a hip against the side of the man starting to lean against him to get him moving – swaying as he was, as if he were drunk on pain and thoughts of murder for pain inflicted. "Because you are human."

Victor opened his eyes, looked at him from just inches away.

"And so are you."

Orden smiled. It was all teeth and no humour, and just as murderous as Victor‘s own.

"Make me forget it then."

It held a burning challenge, and Victor never backed down from a challenge.

Even if it was a long shot.

~

Later that night, or morning, Victor stared up at the moon fading into fallow shadows. Over the tops of the Gallows the first rays of the sun were breaking across the black stone that guarded Kirkwall.

It was a long shot. He curled an arm tighter around the man who had dug his fingers into Victor‘s shirt, dried blood still under his newly regrown nails as his face clenched in his sleep, his teeth bared in unheard defiance.

It was a long shot. But Victor wasn‘t the best sharpshooter in the five high seas for nothing. _Revenge is best served cold._

~~~

**Author's Note:**

> ... and three years later they rape, pillage and murder everyone involved. And not involved.
> 
> Then Hawke comes along and murders them. Or maybe doesn't. Because Harley of the Guard Said They Did Things. Which they did.


End file.
